


You'll Never Know

by danniellecj



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-25
Updated: 2018-03-25
Packaged: 2019-04-07 21:12:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14089764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/danniellecj/pseuds/danniellecj
Summary: On the summer her son turned five, Annie finds that some things have their way of coming back. (Post-Mockingjay)





	You'll Never Know

**Author's Note:**

> This idea had come to me on my 2nd viewing of Guillermo Del Toro’s “The Shape of Water and I distinctly remembered how much I love the small similarities between Elisa/The Fishman and Annie/Finnick. It’s been such a long time in between and seeing a film like that reminded me how much I miss these characters and here I am suddenly writing about them again.
> 
> The song I listened to was the one with Renee Fleming which is also available in the film's soundtrack. I'm happy to welcome and read your thoughts.
> 
> My tumblr is finnicksghost.

It had been a particular busy summer. 2 weeks after Ronan had turned five, Annie had decided to give away some of the old things she had found whilst cleaning up the house. Things like expensive capitol jewelry or baskets and chairs they don’t need, shoes and clothes that no longer fit. (Finnick’s clothes however, remained untouched for the whole of the morning she had started cleaning their closet).

Today they would start with the attic. Ronan, had been excited as he helped his mommy cleaned up some of the old stuff in the attic. He would dart her a smile every now and then, whenever he saw her with her dark hair tied messily and the occasional tired sigh he’d hear. He’s rarely ever in the attic due to how scary it seemed but being here with his mommy and the summer sun illuminating it didn’t seem scary at all. There were big suitcases with bright colors, weird feathered hats, a bicycle and toy boats. He had only begun to pull out one of the toy boats when he finds it. It looks like a huge book but it’s too thin to be a book so he opens the small slit at the top as a shiny black circular disc. He remembers his teacher at school talking to them about music and that one of the old instruments that played had a funny name to it, so he runs up to Annie who is crouched over a small trunk, wiping the sweat over her forehead.

He shows her the disc in his small arms, “Mama, look what I found!”

Annie’s smile fades when she sees at what he’s holding and stares at it like a ghost. It’s an old vinyl record, something she remembered Finnick taking home from his Capitol visits. Finnick liked a lot of music, but took a fondness for jazz songs. Slow, romantic and something he often took pleasure in dancing to, with her. After the war, Annie had put most of Finnick’s records with his clothes, locked away in the comfort of that huge closet. Some nights she spent often weeping in that closet alone when the grief strikes terribly.  
She takes the record from the boys’ arms carefully, afraid that it may break. It had gathered dust but she wipes it off with her arm and sees the record title in its thick yellow font which lingers like Finnick’s small poems on her dresser.

“It’s an old record,” she answers to Ronan’s curious looks. She smiles at his questioning look and explains to him the mechanics of it, reveling in the way he gets excited over it. 

“Can we listen to it? I bet it still plays!” her boy asks, giddiness evident in his voice. 

Ronan had gotten his father’s interest in music. He loved the wedding song and the Siren song that she sings to him when he can’t sleep. Sometimes when she goes away, it’s her son’s voice that brings her back.

Annie smiles at her tiny son and offers her hand to him, “C’mon,” she invites. Ronan takes her hand as they head towards the living room, where the record player sits.  
He watches as his mother takes out a small box beneath the shelves and places it on the table. She blows the dust off it, carefully removing the record off its cover and placing it delicately on the player. She smiles at her son’s curious looks before placing the needle on top of the record. 

When the first note plays and the velvet voice starts it’s as if she’s 21 again, and Finnick is holding her in his arms. The living room is quiet and the moon bright.

“You’ll never know how much I miss you” he sings along, his breath warm against her neck as they sway to the music. Warm tears cover her cheeks that he’d kiss away. It’s a week before Snow takes him away from her. 

She holds him tightly, burying herself in his arms, afraid this how this might be their last dance. He makes promises that night, ones that are peppered in kisses to cover up the lies she knows he’s hiding. But she listens and believes in it anyway, because he only wants to protect her. And isn’t that good enough?

So, when he spins her quietly, the room shifts and she is in her wedding dress, he in his suit. Her heart is soaring when she looks at him and there is nothing but joy. The music softly plays as he pulls her back to his arms and whispers in, “And if I tried I still couldn’t hide, my love for you / You oughta know, for haven’t I told you so/ a million or more times”. She kisses him after and the happiness is infinite at the time being.

But the first night after he left for the Capitol she remembers the words of it quietly coming back to the empty space besides with her arms wrapped around his pillow, “You went away and my heart went with you”.

When she came back to Disctrict 4 and Johanna had helped her unpack; in a fit of anger and loss she had broken some of the old records sitting in the bottom of the shelves besides the poetry books Finnick had also loved reading to her. The fact that the things he loved had stayed and he couldn’t, was so painful, it had taken her months before she could get herself to even look at them.

When the song ends, she can feel quiet wet tears on her face and she gives in to the grief that tugs her heart. 

“Mama, are you okay?” he asks, as he hugs her tightly, his small arms wrapping themselves on her legs, scared that she might leave him too long. She looks back at her son. Their son, with his eyes and smile and her hair and softness; pulling him close to her, “I’m fine baby. I just miss your daddy.” She says, kissing the top of his head, her voice tinged with sadness. “He used to sing this song to me a lot and we’d dance to it here, in this living room.”

“Was he a good dancer?” he asks and Annie laughs, remembering the times he’d lose a step or slip in between those moments when he’d get distracted, “Yeah, he was.”  
Ronan laughs at the thought but he suddenly gets an idea, “Maybe you can teach me so I can dance with you too!”

She looks back at the same green eyes that she’s sure is from Finnicks and laughs. “I’d love that.”

She watches him hold out his small hands, as she lifts him up into her arms. “You’re getting so big!” she exclaims at the growing boy as he smiles proudly. She secures his small body against her arms. 

The music flows as she turns and moves gracefully. Ronan bobs his head, closing his eyes, trying to mimic the singer’s voice in a way that makes her laugh. She thinks he’ll enjoy the rest of the records when she shows him. The thought makes her smile.

“You’ll never know if you don’t know now”


End file.
